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India vs China — Graphically

Nationalism is the animal’s way of marking a territory in a more legible form.

From South America to Southeast Asia, various groups are also fighting for the right to self-determination. What a drug the nationalism is! However, it is more surprising than any of its equivalents that we see from how people can or would do for its sake—to the extent of killing each other for many decades ceaselessly. My hometown is just the perfect example. On the other hand, when development has been equated with numbers and figures, humanity is the first casualty. No tradition of the oldest civilisation or the level of spiritual progress is no match for the ever-increasing dependence on material development.

In this context, India and China are projected to be the next superpowers. Some promising decades are on the horizon though the two countries are relatively different as the numbers and figures show; yet it is certain: for as long as some ends are met, the collateral damages, the peripheries and other seemingly insignificant things are overlooked. Both these countries are notorious for human rights violation though majority of the people would deny it because their nationalist mask would be under threat. They are neighbours. They shared some common problems because of territory. They have the world’s oldest civilisations. And so on. Here’s a brief comparison between the two countries. Will we stop dying from violence if the GDP touches 10%? Will the state stop looking at border areas as a piece of land that should exist for strategic importance, while the natives are dehumanised when the military spending exceeds 1,000 billion? Should we wait for the life expectancy to reach 200 years so that we know we might not be killed anytime like it is now? Or should we just become nationalists and sing paean for the nation and overlook the brute injustice all around us?